Individuals who may be confined to a wheelchair may desire the ability to use motor vehicles such as passenger cars, vans, buses and trucks (hereinafter vehicles). The availability of hand controls for operating motor vehicles may provide disabled individuals confined to a wheelchair, a certain degree of autonomy by allowing them to operate the vehicle. With the ability to drive vehicles, individuals who may be confined to a wheelchair can experience a high degree of mobility and independence.
One problem facing the disabled driver, as well as wheelchair users riding as passengers, is entering and exiting the vehicle. Various wheelchair assist mechanisms have been developed which may allow for the lifting and positioning of the wheelchair into the vehicle. However, these wheelchair assist mechanisms may be costly and may add considerable weight to the vehicle. The added weight of the wheelchair assist mechanisms may adversely affecting the fuel economy of the vehicle.
Lifting mechanisms have been designed that may lift the individual confined to the wheelchair out of the wheelchair and into the vehicle. These types of lifting mechanisms may be costly and may add considerable weight to the vehicle. Further, these lifting mechanisms require either the individual in the wheelchair or another individual to fold and place the wheelchair in the vehicle.
Many vehicle safety systems such as airbags may be designed based on the proper positioning of a vehicle occupant in a deployment zone. Vehicle safety system may be deployed based on readings monitored by sensors located in the vehicle. For example, a vehicle seat sensor may indicate position and/or weight of the occupant in the vehicle seat. Present wheelchair assist mechanisms generally modify the vehicle by removing the vehicle seat. Thus, present wheelchair assist mechanisms may alter the effective operation of airbag deployment by blocking the deployment of the airbag.
Therefore, it would thus be desirable to provide a system and method that overcome the above problems by providing a wheelchair assist system that allows for easy ingress/egress to/from a vehicle and which allows for the deployment of an airbag within the vehicle.